Apartheid is not Dead

Apartheid is not dead. This was the message of the clash at Boipatong on June 17 which left 42 dead — without doubt in an incident orchestrated by the “Zulu” Inkatha movement — and the police repression three days after which left three dead. In the true spirit of apartheid the Boipatons police felt able to inform the Goldstone commission of inquiry that recordings of police messages from Boipatong had, unfortunately, been wiped. And on September 7 the army of one of apartheid’s homelands, Ciskei, massacred several dozen demonstrators at Bisho.

Many both in South Africa and abroad have been satisfied by the current institutional reforms and negotiations. However for millions of Blacks, apartheid continues in their daily misery and oppression. De Klerk, the reformer, is wholly responsible for the recent murders. It is his regime that has continued to prop up puppet regimes such as that in Ciskei, which is supposed to represented the “national” independence of the Xhosa people. It is De Klerk’s police who have continued their complicity with Inkatha’s murderous campaign. And it is the South African state which he heads that has shown itself incapable of bringing about the slightest improvement in the social conditions in the Black townships.

The negotiations (and in particular the CODESA conferencel) have not escaped the framework of the old system. At the negotiating table De Klerk’s regime sits surrounded by all the inheritors of “separate development” — all the Bantustan chiefs and ethnic parties. The escalation of violence and the deliberate stirring of ethnic tensions by Buthelezi’s Inkatha party are all part of a struggle to influence the balance of forces at the negotiating table. They are not some remnant of the past, but one of the ways in which the regime is trying to limit the scope of reforms.

Hard core of the system

The aim is to ensure that universal suffrage and the formal ending of discrimination do not go so far as to threaten to the hard core of the system, its social relations of exploitation. To maintain the “gains” of apartheid, the De Klerk regime has thus tried to push the negotiations in the direction of a federalist blueprint. The regions this would create would, the regime calculates, maintain and reinforce ethnic fragmentation among Blacks and favour coalitions and collaborationism in local institutions.

In order to get his way De Klerk must build the Bantustans and ethnic prejudices into the new system. Insofar as Inkatha violence or the Bisho massacre force the African National Congress (ANC) to accept a federalist compromise that will lastingly weaken the struggle for a non-racial society, they serve De Klerk’s policy.

The size of the country, regional social, economic and historic differences would seem to speak in favour of some form of federalism. The regime well understands how to use such a “commonsense” argument — flourishing at various times the Swiss, Nigerian or Yugoslav examples. However, all this is to overlook the fact that in the South African case there has always been racial oppression exercised by a white minority.

Reinforced federalism will therefore not address the basic democratic issue; on the contrary it will tend to further fragment and therefore weaken, the collective strength of the Black masses. Such a federalism would not mean a decentralization of power in order to ensure better social control to the Black population but would merely be a way of preserving the political weight of the white elites and owning classes under a new form.

Talks broken off

The decision by the ANC on June 21 to break off the CODESA negotiations was the sign of deep disillusionment, as the ANC leadership realized that these discussions were leading to no reduction whatever in the level of violence directed against its own activists and supporters. They found out that each apparent retreat by the regime on this or that point was each time anticipated by a new offensive on some other terrain of the talks.

This was what happened when the government came up with its proposals for a second chamber while the ANC was putting all its energies into pursuing the question of an interim government. Nelson Mandela’s movement thus found himself systematically dragged along in the wake of De Klerk’s initiatives, as the latter bit by bit revealed new elements in a coherent constitutional project.

This could be seen at the time of the whites-only referendum of March 17, 1992. After some 69% voted “yes” to De Klerk’s proposals, Mandela declared: “we hope that National Party leaders will stop regarding themselves as leaders of an ethnic group but that they will regard themselves now as part of the leadership of the total population” (Saturday Star, March 21,1992).

De Klerk had certainly explained two days before that he considered himself “bound by his mandate (The Citizen, March 19, 1992). But the mandate in question had equally clearly been given on the basis of a dozen “bottom line principles” which, taken together, amounted to a barricade of safeguards for keeping the white minority veto. The referendum had, without doubt, a contradictory impact on the ANC’s strategy, but Mandela’s ambiguities, as shown in his above-quoted remark, also smoothed the way for the regime’s attack.

There was growing discontent in the ANC, in particular among its intermediary cadres and inside the COSATU union confederation. Above all, the rank-and-file lost patience and confidence and the moment was approaching when the leadership risked repudiation. The CODESA trap was closing, gravely endangering the unity of the anti-apartheid movement. If the negotiations were to be continued then at least the rules had to be changed.

The mass campaign announced by the ANC/Communist Party/COSATU coalition, which was said to be aimed at bringing down the government and imposing a constituent assembly, led to the general strike of August 3 and 4. Other mass actions were planned such as the September 7 demonstration at Bisho and others subsequently.

Nonetheless, the ANC’s basic perspective remains that of negotiations. It felt the need to make up lost ground, increase its ability to bring pressure and respond to the exasperation of the rank-and- file. Discussions with the government could only be resumed if they were seen to represent a new “stage” in the introduction of a “post-apartheid” society.

Behind the scenes

An editorialist on the South Africa Labour Bulletin provides a good summary of the behind-the-scenes debates in the ANC, the Communist Party and the union confederation: “There is every indication that the tripartite alliance, or at least COSATU, and the militant wing of the ANC and the SACP, have done a fundamental rethink on negotiation. They intend the campaign to have such an impact on the balance of forces that it results in a new negotiating forum and a new negotiating agenda. If the campaign is successful, its leaders will probably demand a negotiating forum that reflects the role of mass organizations such as COSATU and the civics movement, in the process of political change” (SALB, July 1992).

It is necessary to underline the impatience of sections of the population radicalized by two years of negotiations and waiting. Each day the television told them of the great changes, while daily life was getting worse. Thus wages have lost ground against inflation of around 16%. However, the cost of a shopping basket of food for a family has risen by 28% and vegetables by 80%. The mines have seen 3,000 redundancies a month. The textile workers’ union (SACTWU) has stated that 20,000 of its members have lost their jobs. In metal and engineering, 35,000 jobs went in 1991 and a further 13,000 in the first six months of this year.

Despite a rather disappointing turnout for May Day this year, there has been a sharp rise in union actions and strikes in recent months. One of the most significant was by healthworkers in June and July which affected 59 hospitals throughout the country in support of a rise in the minimum wage, an across-the-board 15.3% wage rise and security for long term “temporary” workers.

August general strike

The general strike in August thus showed that, despite the weakening of organized social movements, popular combativity remains high. The strike was massively observed as broad sections of the Black population showed their continuing readiness to respond to calls for mobilization and action. This indicates a questioning amongst the most militant sectors: negotiate, of course, but with what attention to the social struggles and the balance of forces on the ground?

This problem is illustrated by an episode from the inner life of the engineering union. In May, the NUMSA leadership organized the distribution of a leaflet entitled “prepare the war” against redundancies and wage restrictions. Then came the success of August 3 and 4. On August 8, the union leadership met and proposed to the branches a compromise with the bosses which included the abandonment of the demand for a moratorium on redundancies, its replacement by the negotiation of various forms of short-time working, temporary plant closures and early retirement, or, simply, payment for 15 weeks of retraining after being made redundant.

Thus, in a few weeks, the union had passed from conducting a “war” against redundancies to a proposal for managing enterprise reform — despite a massive general strike. On August 11 the regional leadership in eastern Witwatersrand responded: “the proposals from the NEC are substantively unacceptable. Our members have consistently demanded… serious protection against daily threat of retrenchment. That is why we, as a union, put forward the demand for a moratorium… Our strike is supposed to threaten the bosses. It seems that, with this approach, we are more scared of our strike than they are… It is our members who are being tear-gassed by the police and threatened and even killed by Inkatha, risking their jobs and even their lives. More than 20,000 are on strike in this region alone. We therefore strongly believe that it must be those very members who must take any decision on a compromise”.

This dispute is between a large regional branch of one of the main COSATU unions; thus this is an important affair, involving substantial forces.

In a general sense we have seen in recent months a union strategy centered on the search for compromise with the bosses and on the working out of reorganization plans for specific branches of industry. This is in line with the spirit of the CODESA negotiations, but above all it corresponds to the ideas in the union leaderships on the means to employ to overcome the crisis, revive production and build a “post-apartheid” society.

This is essentially a neo-Keynesian conception based on the negotiation of a new distribution of income and the search for new ways of being internationally competitive. Thus the miners’ union (NUM) has presented a programme of measures to meet the crisis in their sector. This was presented as a “co-determination” project at the Mining Summit organized with the Employers’ Chamber (Dot Keet, “Negotiation and actions towards the general strike, South Africa Labour Bulletin, July 1992). However, in the present period in South Africa, the bosses take from these plans only what suits them from the point of view of tying in the unions. They make almost no concessions on social demands and pursue the restructuring of enterprises in their own way.

Charter blueprint

We could see the unions’ policy at work on the eve of the August strike when COSATU signed a blueprint for a charter with the SACCOLA employers’ union.2 The two parties announced that they were going to organize and call together on all South Africans to make August 3 a “day for peace, democracy and economic restructuring”. “SACCOLA and COSATU intend to organize assemblies in all the major centres in South Africa together with the churches… (they) call upon employers and trade unions, in both the private sector and public sectors and all other South Africans to do likewise… To ensure success the parties will establish a steering committee to address the issue of adequate resources, planning, logistics and communications, including at the work place”.

COSATU’s plan was to challenge the employers to shut their enterprises on August 3 and 4. This would turn the general strike into a paid holiday. The South Africa Labour Bulletin modestly explains: “The draft agreement eventually floundered when SACCOLA was unable to win support for it from its constituent business organization”.

The peculiar nature of the “leadership” of the employers’ union played some role in the production of this document, which amounts to a plea for a negotiated solution to the social crisis and the establishment of a parliamentary democracy. As a statement of general policy it is far removed from the day-to-day approach of employers on such matters as jobs, training or wages.3

But one paragraph in particular highlights current union strategy. The two parties propose “an open and inclusive approach at both national and industry level to economic restructuring and to agreeing on an economic strategy which will deliver high and sustainable levels of growth and development. To this end, to seek to avoid unilateral economic restructuring and to seek consensus between government, labour and business in this regard”. Aside from its wholly chimerical view, such a declaration by COSATU is in total contradiction with calls for war on the bosses such as that issued by NUMSA in May. But it is in fact the same leaderships who are responsible for both.

To understand the confusion that such contradictions can cause we need to remember that the August strike took place against an economic background that makes the whole philosophy of the SACCOLA/ COSATU agreement redundant. It should be recalled that the government’s plan was to ensure a massive reentry of foreign investment through opening negotiations. On the basis of renewed “confidence” it also hoped that a lot of foreign financial aid would flow into social projects in the townships, calming popular expectations. In fact very little of all this has so far been seen. Worse still, the country has slid further into a recession made still worse by the drought that has struck some rural areas.

Tide of bankruptcies

Bankruptcies rose by 37.7% in the first six months of 1992. An annual report from the Central Bank dated August 26 explains that the country may be into its longest recession since 1908. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has fallen for the third consecutive year — by 0.5% in 1991 and perhaps 2 or 2.5% this year. It is hard to attract foreign capital when South African firms themselves do not believe in investment.

On August 13 — two days after the announcement by the diamond monopoly De Beers of a 26% fall in results in the first six months of 1992 — the Johannesburg stock market fell by 101 points.4 Some banks, furthermore, have called for an agreement with the IMF on a structural adjustment programme. A Catch 22: In order to get the money to pay for socio-economic reforms and revive the domestic market the crisis needs to end, but economic shock treatment can only make the situation of the most deprived even worse.

That should be sufficient argument against any attempt to channel worker militancy into co-management schemes. The storm sweeping the economy leaves no room for social democratic or Keynesian projects and the bulk of the employers will continue to behave as before. There can be no other way out in a market economy driven by the profit motive and the needs of private accumulation.

However, to understand the thinking at the top of the unions we have to recall that they have, in two years, swung from a socialist perspective to “market socialism”, then to the “mixed economy” and then growth through co-responsibility. The ideological development has been headlong, propelled by the deterioration in the balance of forces and the world situation. These two latter factors have gone together with the growth of a union and political bureaucracy.

The ANC leadership retains sufficient prestige to mount big shows of force but with very restricted objectives. The interview with Nelson Mandela from which extracts are published on page 17 shows perfectly the imbalance between the breadth of the mobilizations and their political expression by the ANC.

Nonetheless, the mass actions of past months have a contradictory content. The ANC leaders have made a number of tactical calculations without abandoning their central aim — the interim coalition government. However, mass action tactics have effects independent of political manoeuvres; thus we also have to look at the former’s impact above and beyond the supposed or apparent aims of the ANC leadership.

The mass mobilizations express a definite relation of the masses to the negotiations. It would thus be vain to engage in abstract denunciations of negotiations when millions of people hope they will put an end to their misery. The best policy in these circumstances is to accept this reality and put forward in the social movements demands that help them to take on a radical cutting edge, while also demanding absolute transparency in the negotiations.

The violence and social disintegration in some townships are certainly crucial problems. Nobody can believe that the movement is still on the offensive and that it is a candidate for power. But this does not mean that we are in a situation where it is necessary to reduce aspirations and demands. The problem that is thus posed for the ranks of the ANC and COSATU is: what are the negotiations really about?

An explanation is needed as to why a successful relaunch of mass mobilizations should lead in a few days to a retreat in terms of demands on the regime. One of the most revealing comments came after the publication of the interview with Nelson Mandela from secretary of COSATU’s Western Cape region: “We know the people want action… Whatever he has said does not affect what we’ve planned for October 12 [the day when a special sitting of parliament begins]. We will have a day of action and are not thinking of deviating from our plans”5.

The negotiations are thus going to restart in a new framework — which has been reshaped in a way unforeseen by the two main protagonists. The regime has seen its position weakened by the economic crisis, while the ANC must deal with considerable questioning in its own ranks and beyond.

Footnotes:

1. CODESA — Convention for a Democratic South Africa

2. South Africa Labour Bulletin (SALB), September 1992.

3. A good critical analysis of this is given by SACCAWU’s Roseline Nyman in SALB, September 1992.

4. The value of De Beers’ shares lost $740 m and the firm paid out the second lowest dividend in its history.

5. The Argus, September 17, 1992. The same statement, furthermore, protests against the ANC’s decision to cancel the planned march in the Bophutswana bantustan. It calls for a day of mourning for the 24 killed at Bisho. The local employers who were asked to close for the occasion stated it had “a sympathetic stance” and a “no work, no pay approach”.

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